Star Wars Infinity
by Bob DeFrank
Summary: The Infinity Stones appear in the Star Wars universe...with Thanos in pursuit. Set shortly after the Thrawn trilogy but before Dark Empire.
1. Chapter 1

I

Captain Gilad Pelleaon stared at the figure floating peacefully beneath the curved clear surface of a Spaarti cloning cylinder. A humanoid alien who could have passed for human if not for the blue skin and blue-black hair, and the faint red glow under closed eyelids. The perfect image of a being Pelleaon had become familiar with during the past months, when the fortunes of the failing Empire had begun to turn.

Grand Admiral Thrawn.

The sight shocked him back to that golden moment when it seemed they might regain all that had been lost and give the galaxy the order it desperately needed, thanks to the brilliant leader Pelleaon was honored to stand beside.

Then Bilbringi and the treachery of the Noghri.

Instinctively, Pelleaon's eyes darted to the quiescent being's chest, half expecting to see again a bloodstain spreading on a white uniform. But no: there were no wounds, no scars…

Pelleaon glanced back to the closed eyes and looked closer. Now he saw the well-known red glow was dull rather than pulsing with life. This was an empty shell, living and breathing, but without mind. Nothing but a copy.

With a mental wrench he swung away from the cylinder and the clone inside, fury and revulsion rising in his breast, all the worse for the moment of hope he'd just experienced.

"What is the meaning of this?" he demanded of the only other being in the room, the alien who identified himself as Stent, and who's blue skin and red eyes marked him as the same species as Thrawn. The captain might have been intrigued enough by that alone to comply with the stranger's summons, even if Stent and the organization he claimed to represent, the "Empire of the Hand," hadn't provided Thrawn's own code when they made contact with the _Chimera_.

"Did you bring me here for some obscene joke?" Pelleaon didn't wait for Stent to answer, his anger was so great. "This…_abomination,_"he pointed to the clone, "is an insult to the grand admiral! If you think I'll help you people put a clone puppet in command of the Empire in Thrawn's name, you might as well kill me now. Better the Empire fragmented under a dozen petty warlords than united under a lie!"

His shouts echoed in the domed chamber beneath the ancient, hand-shaped fortress that gave this base its name. Stent merely stood stoic and weathered the storm, mouth tight, then held up a blue hand to forestall the outburst from the outraged Imperial.

"I understand your views, Captain. Indeed I shared them when Syndic Mitth'raw'nuruodo informed us of his contingency plan, but there is something you do not know. Something that will change your mind."

Pellaeon narrowed his eyes. "I doubt very much, Commander Stent, that anything you can tell me would do that."

"Not me," Stent said, and touched a remote control unit on his belt. "The Syndic – the grand admiral – will explain."

A hologram came to life in the middle of the room, resolving into a projection of the real Thrawn, of that there could be no doubt: Pellaeon knew the grand admiral's voice and mannerisms.

In the recording, Thrawn spoke to others not visible, but Pellaeon heard Stent's voice, and another he recognized as that of Voss Parck, an older man who had conveyed his greetings when the Empire of the Hand had contacted the _Chimera_, but was unable to meet Pellaeon in person.

"This was recorded five months before the grand admiral's death," Stent whispered. "He had been pursuing several projects with the potentiality of destroying the Rebellion and restoring order to the galaxy. This was one he found most promising."

Pellaeon nodded and listened. The images in the hologram spoke Basic for Parck's benefit, not the mellifluous Chiss speech.

The hologram of Thrawn crossed his arms, studying one of his omnipresent artworks, although this was one Pellaeon had not seen before.

"Grand Admiral, forgive me my doubts," Voss Parck's voice. "Your insights you have gleaned from studying a culture's artwork has always served us well, but what you are suggesting here seems…"

"Mysticism bordering on superstition?" Thrawn responded, half-distracted but still hitting the mark precisely. "You might think so, but there are too many interplays in styles that could not have come about naturally, dating from a time before the hyperspace era, and they coincide with too many myths and too many phenomena unexplained by science to be simply dismissed. And need I remind you our late lamented Emperor himself appeared to think these…items…worth pursuing?"

The holo of Thrawn walked about the artwork, calling up images of other pieces, both primitive art and products of more advance, if planet-bound, civilizations. Finally a holo of an ancient and crumbling scroll unrolled itself before Thrawn, with several translations of the text appearing below.

"But talismans that can make gods out mere mortals?" the recording of Stent ventured.

"Those mortals worthy to hold such power, while the unworthy are driven mad or destroyed outright," Thrawn said. "But yes, historical records suggest it, and recent phenomena appears to confirm as much. Six-" he frowned. "Six stones, one might call them, though it would be more accurate to describe them as condensed incarnations of the fundamental principles of creation. Power, Soul, Time, Space, Reality, and Mind. Items that, if they come into a being's hands, will enable the being to direct that power.

"Infinity Stones.

"I believe these items have either surfaced in recent years or have become accessible."

"Accessible, Syndic?" Stent asked.

"They may not have been in our galaxy. They may not even have been in our particular multiverse, but they are now. About half a year earlier, Imperial scientific outposts observed certain anomalies. I believe the Rebellion's outposts may have detected them as well, though the Rebels have been so consumed with us they've not recognized the import. Though that is not something I will count on, particularly when one of our adversaries is Luke Skywalker. A true Jedi is among the ranks of the Rebellion. His-" Thrawn's lips tightened in genuine annoyance. "-unorthodox means of gaining information have proven troublesome, and made him and the Rebels difficult adversaries.

"Hopefully, our clone Jedi Joruus C'baoth, will neutralize Skywalker while I advance my own objective."

"Which would be? You intend to hunt these…Infinity Stones?" Parck asked. Pellaeon, from his observation outside, had been on the point of asking just that question. How quickly he fell back into the role of Thrawn's second, waiting for clarification and preparing to carry out the grand admiral's commands. He returned his focus on the hologram.

"One particular Infinity Stone. The Mind Stone," Thrawn waved his hands and more records appeared around him. "If the stories are true, the one who possesses and masters this stone will wield power of information and sentience itself. Not only capable of absolute brilliance, but of accessing information, extrapolating possibilities. Power to rival the vaunted Jedi clairvoyance. One could even read the thoughts of others and influence those thoughts. With such a talisman a worthy being would be able to outwit any opponent.

"And it has another valuable attribute that would ensure our victory," Thrawn went on. "You have wondered about the…sleeper…below?"

"The clone," Stent said coldly.

"As you know, war carries its hazards, and though my Noghri bodyguards are second to none, no one's life is certain, and if humility will permit me, I believe my death would prove disastrous to the Empire. Its unity is yet precarious. I have taken measures to secure possible successors, though none have yielded results quite to my satisfaction-"

Pellaeon's heart sank, though he was not surprised.

"Though my current second and flagship captain in the Empire proper has demonstrated potential, Captain Pellaeon is not quite ready yet to step into the supreme commander's role."

Pellaeon wanted to check the floor for his jaw.

"Which leaves us with this Mind Stone. I do not speak of presenting a poor copy. I believe the Mind Stone, in conjunction with a flash learner, would enable a perfect duplication of my mind in the clone's body, should any untoward accident or enemy action find it's mark."

Stent deactivated the hologram.

"And such a thing has," he said. "From the Syndic's last communication, we know he sent a team of Noghri to pursue a lead in the known galaxy. But this was after Leia Organa Solo discovered the Empire's deception and the Noghri turned traitor. This team may have heard word at some point, and if they continued their mission or secured the Mind Stone, they would not have brought it to the Syndic. We have very limited sources of information in those regions of the galaxy, but with your connections we might find the Mind Stone."

Pellaeon brushed his mustache. "Not an easy prospect," he said. "The higher ranks of the Empire have always been staffed by men of a…certain temperament," brutal and eager for power. "Thrawn did what he could to promote more worthy officers, but since his death Empire has begun fragmenting once again. I can promise you a handful of ships and some assets and contacts in Imperial Intelligence."

"We can make that work," Stent said readily. "I would lead the team myself, but as I've said I am not familiar with your part of the galaxy, and I am somewhat distinct."

Pellaeon nodded. "I have someone you can work with. The man who killed the assassin Rukh. I think he would be up to the challenge. His name is Grodin Tierce."

II

The man who called himself Grodin Tierce but who was both less and much, much more walked the halls and corridors of the Hand of Thrawn installation unbeknownst to its renegade Imperial and red-eyed Chiss attendants.

The Hand of Thrawn. Everything he saw and heard tingled memories at the edge of his consciousness. If Tierce closed his eyes he could imagine reaching out with blue hands and looking down to see a white uniform.

Because Grodin Tierce was dead and the man who walked these halls was a clone, indistinguishable from the original but with an important addition: Grand Admiral Thrawn's memories and something of his genius, though not the details of the alien's life.

Though when Tierce concentrated, he felt almost the outlines of that life, as if groping through dark water and finding and identifying objects by touch and discerning their use.

To his surprise, simply by being here and hearing these Chiss speak, he found he was capable of speaking their strange language as well, the muscles of his mouth forming the words as naturally as Basic.

He had told know one, but this and other memories had allowed him to leave the guarded sitting room and to plant the 'surprises' that would come in handy later, when the time came to claim this facility.

Tierce smiled savagely.

Everything was happening as that strange being who'd contacted him and identified himself as one of the late Emperor's own agents had said. He knew that he would be ordered to find the Mind Stone, and he knew what the Mind Stone was and could do, but it would not be the copy of Thrawn that would be restored, no, when Tierce held the Mind Stone the dark water that covered his Chiss memories would be swept away, and Tierce would become something so much greater than what he had been.

The Empire would have a new commander, for Tierce and Tierce alone was the man to carry Emperor Palpatine's vision forward. The first of a new breed of clone warlords, bred to rule and to give the galaxy the unity of an iron fist.

He re-entered his suite just in time to salute Captain Pellaeon and meet this Commander Stent, a loyal man, Tierce judged, who would unfortunately die for the New Empire.


	2. Chapter 2

II

"Han Solo."

At the sound of his name, Han spun, hand on the blaster at his side, but didn't draw on the other human at the bar, who he'd have sworn wasn't there a micro sec ago.

"Keep 'em holstered!" the bartender, an Aqualish who looked like he could double as the bouncer, growled.

"That's the welcome I get?" the man smirked and took the stool beside Han.

"Dash Rendar," Han said and raised his shot glass. "Not a smart idea to sneak up on me."

"Like you could even hit me," Dash might have been talking to himself. "Pour me one," he said to the Aqualish, then pointed his thumb at Han. "On him."

"On me?"

"You're the one wanted to see me, Solo. I've got places to be, and you've got cash to spare. Ask the wife for a loan. Besides, didn't you want to congratulate me? You must have heard the news."

"You beat my record," Han said. No point dancing around when Dash was so obviously enjoying himself. Han Solo, champion of the Kessel Run, had been dethroned and Dash Rendar now held the title.

"I'm beating all your old record, last time I checked. Getting slow, Solo," Rendar chuckled.

Han shrugged, but his teeth were clenched briefly in irritation under his smirk.

"What can I say Rendar? I've been too busy blowing up Death Stars and taking out red-eyed Imp grand admirals to keep up with the old racing days."

"That's what you say, Solo, while you're tagging along on your wife's skirt," Dash said and took a drink. "Maybe playing chauffer to your space sorcerer buddy. But hey, we all slow down and need somebody else to get the job done. That why you wanted to meet me, by the way? Cause maybe you heard: I'm the pilot to get things where they need to be."

He jumped off the stool. "Who knows? Maybe if I'd met myself the right pair of space tramps, it'd be General Rendar. Or maybe King Rendar," he tilted his head. "Why don't they call you King Solo anyway? At least Prince. Maybe ask the wife if she considered it while you were on ice and she ran into me."

"Carbonite," Han said.

"Whatever. I'm sure you had sweet dreams while she came to your rescue."

Now it was Han's turn to laugh. If Dash meant to rile him up, he missed the mark with that one. How many scruffy nerfherders are lucky enough to get woken up by a princess? Not exactly awakened with a kiss, but still straight out of a fairy tale.

He turned, ready to deliver a smart-aleck retort, and for the first time looked Dash Rendar full in the face.

Words failed him. There was something about Dash Rendar's face, something in his eyes, that didn't look right. A blue glint, a brief spark, and Han felt…he didn't know what.

Dash smiled. "It's a little stuffy in here. The Outrider's in Dock 17. You want to talk more, I'll be there. Thanks for the drink, old-timer."

One hand in his pocket, he walked past the cantina's tables, passed a towering Wookie in the corner and paused to slap his hairy shoulder. "Hey furball!"

Chewbacca howled and patron's ducked under tables. He hauled back and swung with near-blinding speed in what should have been a slap to the side of Rendar's head, then grunted in confusion as his swipe hit only empty air. Somehow Rendar had…jumped? Stepped aside? Han must have blinked and missed it, because the pilot was now just out of reach, grinning.

"Ever get tired of playing homebody, think about signing up with me," Dash said and strolled out the door.

Han paid the bartender and went over to Chewbacca. "Why didn't you let me know he'd come in?"

Chewbacca growled.

"He didn't come in?" Han look around but could spot no other door to the cantina. That's strange. Sure you weren't sleeping on the job?"

Another snarl.

"Kidding old buddy, kidding. Let's get some air."

They stepped outside the artificially-conditioned air of the cantina and into the near-alpine chill of the peaks that nestled the landing port of Orn Balla. Like most spacer ports, it was a bustle of different species and a crossroads for smugglers. Han wondered how it was Dash Rendar had gotten here. Last time he'd heard, the other smuggler had been halfway across the galaxy.

_Suppose news travels fast._

He looked around but could see no sign of the other pilot, but a small, trundling astromech droid trilled and whistled to get his attention. Han guessed at their meaning.

"Haven't heard any word from Luke yet," Han said, distracted. The Jedi had parted company with them shortly after landing, and had left Artoo Detoo with Han and Chewie, taking a moment to console the droid like a pet or partner.

"_Sorry Artoo, but I'm going into some dense jungle. I know you weren't all that happy back on Dagobah. Just imagine what it would be like for you in the lowlands."_

He was here for some Jedi business, Force visions seemed to be taking him from one end of the Galaxy to the other since they'd taken out that blue, red-eyed devil Thrawn and his crazy pet dark side clone. Luke had shown up and tagged along at the last minute when Han was prepping the Falcon to fly to Ballanar, the planet.

Once they'd landed, Luke boarded a supply transport to one of the frontier mining outposts, leaving Han to cool his heels and conduct his own brand of business. A certain smuggler and hotshot pilot was making more of a name for himself, and who, according to Talon Karrde and his smuggling contacts seemed to have discovered a new hyperspace route or two, because that was the only way he could jump from one sector to another in a snap of his fingers.

Han had stepped up to look into that, chiefly because he knew the space-jock involved, and because among his recent accomplishments was beating Han's old records.

Han didn't mind retiring at the top, when he had bigger things to do, but knowing someone else was beating his times…

Leia had given him a look that said she was reading his mind, but diplomatically she didn't mention it.

And there was something different about Rendar. Han thought back to that look in his eyes. It made him think of that first moment punching the hyperdrive and seeing the stars streak into lines of white as he plunged out of the slow, mundane universe and into one of speed.

"Okay, let's see what ol' Dash is flying these days-"

Another grunt beside him.

"What?" the Wookie was sniffing the air a meter or two from the entrance. "You don't smell his trail?" Another grumble. "I know that's what you said, but it's not like he can just walk out of the place and disappear."

Trailing behind, Artoo beeped wildly but was ignored.


	3. Chapter 3

III

Luke Skywalker made his way through dense jungle, occasionally using his lightsaber when the path was overgrown, but generally making good time. The aboriginal child who served as a guide for a few credits and the promise of more had left him about an hour ago: the offworlder could make his own way from here. Luke couldn't blame it for not wanting to face tormented ghosts on cursed ground.

Colonists and frontier miners might scoff, but Luke found the natives had more wisdom in this case.

Trees towered over him, liana vines wound tight about the trunks as if strangling them, but though the branches were an excellent perch for razorcats, serpents or other analogs to use as a perch to conceal themselves and leap on the unwary, but Luke's lightsaber was quiet at his side. The jungle was deathly silent: no sign of fauna, and if it could, the flora would uproot itself to flee along with them.

This jungle stank with the dark side of the Force.

A new phenomena, Luke sensed, not a blight that touched generations. The natives had made that clear, using their pidgin dialect, that only in the past months that a charismatic duv'a, or shaman, who called itself Tesh Mejy, or Binder of the Dead, had gathered what amounted to a death cult to itself and began raiding villages for captives who were never seen again.

For the most part, they had stayed clear of the frontier miners and so had gone largely unnoticed, but a brave aboriginal had managed to stow away on a ship to a more developed world and made it's way to a consulate office to beg aid of the New Republic.

Perhaps it was Leia's own Force sense that had brought this missive to her attention, and her mention of it had given focus to Luke's own visions. Learning Han and Chewie were coming to this planet made Luke's path clear.

The Force meant for him to be here, and when the time came the Force would show him what needed doing. Then he would do it.

Because he was a Jedi.

Right now, at least, his course was obvious: track the dark side to where the taint was strongest. If nothing else: he would purify this piece of jungle, otherwise this region would be blighted and dangerous for many centuries to come.

Luke sensed something else drawing him.

A tree-covered hill rose before him and the path snaked upward. He stopped and looked down the path. He had found no trace of this death cult nor the prisoners, until now.

On either side of the path, two bodies hung from trees.

They had died badly, and they had died slow, he recognized the signs from hearing the stories of Tuscan Raiders growing up, and their agonies and delirium was like a physical blow, but Luke stood unbowed beneath it and looked over the bodies. Dispassionate eyes hid the compassion beneath.

_A welcome or a warning? I'll take it to heart, but not in the way they expect._

He leapt, caught a tree branch and pulled himself onto the branch, then struck out into the jungle, its trees and foliage. He went around or over obstacles when he could, occasionally slicing his way through with his lightsaber.

He took as straight a route as he could up the hill itself, finding ledges and handholds only a natural climber like Chewbacca might. Luke found himself wishing he had brought the Wookie with him. He'd do well out here. But no: Luke wouldn't chance bringing any non-Jedi to this place. It would have a dangerous effect-

Luke heard a whisper through the Force. Calls for help. Pleas for mercy. For parents, siblings, hatchmates. More whispers than he could make out. If he wanted to listen, but he knew there was nothing he could do to help them.

Luke had never felt impressions of the dead so clearly. Never so _present_.

"Are you coming to help us?"

The aboriginal child who had guided him here was sitting on a nearby branch where no one had been before, kicking it's feet idly as it looked out sadly across the tainted jungle.

Luke thought back to the village and how no one would speak to him, but when this one child approached then all the rest fled and hid. But they had peered from doors and around corners as the Jedi spoke to…to empty air from their perspective.

"They came in the night and surrounded our village," it said. "They slit the watchers' throats. Then the Tesh Mejy made everyone come out. It picked one in ten and rounded them up. Then parents, children, siblings, called out and begged the Binder to take them instead. Those were the ones he took. The ones who asked to be taken. The ones no one would trade themselves for, it killed then and there."

The child looked down. It's ears trembled and it made a keening sound in it's throat. It's species' equivalent of low sobs.

Luke could see it in his mind. He shared the memory. This child had offered itself in it's younger sibling's place. The cultists had to pull the little one away when they took the self-offered child. Luke recognized the little one from the village and gave that image to the child-spirit, letting it know the sibling was well.

"The Tesh took us to the place of killing and they all took out knives," the guide went on. "Some they killed quick. Others slow. The Binder wanted something."

Luke should have been there to help, but this had all happened when Luke was too occupied with Thrawn and C'boath. It was why he needed to train more Jedi.

The guide followed Luke, but faded away as he came to the dark altar at the center of the swamp of dark side.

_Sacrifice. The Tesh wanted sacrifice._

O

As Luke passed, a tall figure unfolded itself from behind a tree. Lean and sinewy, with a long black cloak and a hood. A pale face twisted in a grin, revealing sharp fangs. In one hand, he held a polearm topped with a long, curved blade.


	4. Chapter 4

IV

Luke found the site soon enough. A clearing where nothing grew or would grow for some time, hung with gory decorations. A tree stump two meters in diameter had served as the altar of sacrifice, where the cult had performed its filthy rites, and a deep pit filled with refuse that had once been living beings.

Faces had been carved on the trees, but by who he could not say. The dendric faces were twisted, as if in inescapable torment that would be endured season after season until the trees fell or this world ended.

Before the altar was a chair, carved in a similar style: twisted bodies packed one on top of the other to support the occupant as a throne. The armrests terminated in faces that were both agonized and lustful.

There was a body on the throne, weeks dead by the look of it. No carrion eater had picked at the corpse, but time and heat had worked on the flesh.

Luke circled the clearing before drawing near, searching for signs of hostile life, but the dark side rot blocked his senses. Finally he stepped into the clearing, feeling exposed but not afraid. When he set foot on the profaned ground, the very earth cried out to him and again he saw figures out of the corner of his eye, begging for attention he dared not give, though he would answer their calls, if too late.

He approached the corpse of the Binder, for it could be no other. The creature who had reigned over this death.

_And still does, Jedi outworlder filth!_

The hatred and malice of the mental 'voice' sent waves a nausea through him that would have had an unprepared interloper bent double, vomiting and bleeding out of nose and eyes.

A dark form took shape, unmistakably it had been the body on the throne. Yellow eyes were sunken deep in a face old before it's time. Animated by a power that upheld the Binder even as it devoured.

_It is mine, mine to win and mine to keep!_

"You can keep nothing," Luke projected his voice and the dark spirit rippled, flinched and waivered, like a miasma that would be blown aside by a dark wind, but instead condensed. "Whatever power you tried to grasp has destroyed you. I'm here to finish you and undo your obscenity."

_I may not be undone!_ The Binder snarled. _I won it. It is mine. I sought to open its power with the deaths of others until I saw what needed to be done._

The presence grinned a bloody grin.

_I took it. I have it, and with it, I alone will have power over all the living and the dead!_

A wet cackle.

"You are nothing," Luke repeated, but the being remained, grasping at life as it would always continue to seize and grasp.

_You think so, Jedi? Come and finish me, then, if you can!_

It seemed to speak from a long way off then. Luke was an arm's length from the corpse. It's eyesockets were twin black pits and it's hands were clenched over its breastbone, sinews tight. It had gripped the object even before rigor mortis set in.

_Or perhaps I should come to you._

The voice was behind him. Like a cloak of darkness it blocked out his sight, tightened around him like an arachnid spinning a cocoon. Darkness like being immersed in ice-cold water, stealing breath and life.

_You have come at my service. I command the living. I command the dead. I command you. I will leave this place as you, your flesh a vessel hollowed for my use, you soul one of the multitude I will keep as my playthings!_

Luke half heard the Tesh, but there were others that drew his attention. Many others, seeking him and lending their strength, but one in particular.

_Luke._

_My son._

_Let me look on you with my own eyes._

His mechanical hand closed on the lightsaber and green fire blazed. There was a scream of denial from the dark spirit.

"That's been tried before, by someone far more dangerous than you," he said, thinking of the hell of Mindor and the shadows he faced there.

Then he swung his lightsaber, bisecting the corpse.

Something arose from its gut. A liquid monstrosity that reared up, then reached out for him, part slime and part ectoplasm.

Luke slashed and slashed again, burning away the appendages. A scream rose up that only the soul could hear.

Then it's clenched, six-fingered hand fell to the ground.

Luke heard voices through the tattering vale of darkness, but the voices themselves were not dark at all, nor the false light of glamour that masters of the dark side could project.

Something glowed…orange?...between the clenching fingers. Luke bent, picked up the remains of the fist. The hand that held its treasure so tightly crumbled into ashes, leaving the small orange object to glow in all its soft beauty.

Luke's eyes were wide as he looked on the thing the Binder had sought with his bloody rites.

_No!_ The Binder shrieked. _No, no nooooo! It is mine! You cannot-must not!_

It was fading. Thrashing like a drowning man. _You!_

The Tesh directed it's curse at someone else, and it was almost Luke's only warning.

He ducked and rolled, just in time to avoid a swipe of a blade that would have taken his head off.

He rolled to the crouch and stood, facing an alien creature garbed in the image of death itself. Tall and slender but far from weak, with a hooded cloak that billowed about him, unconscious of the heat. A face thin and white as bone. Black eyes that glared. He held a polearm topped with a wicket blade.

"You'll regret avoiding my strike," he said conversationally. "You'd have saved yourself pain and fear before the end."

Luke slipped the glowing stone in his pocket without thinking, and just as instinctively he took up his lightsaber.

The Binder screamed at the newcomer.

_Traitor! Deceiver! You promised me I would have the power!_

The hooded one swung his weapon through the shadowy presence and it dissipated into nothing.

"I told it how it might put its hand on the Soul Stone, if it was worthy," he said. "As to what would happen next, you've seen as much."

He stalked toward Luke, black cloak swirling.

"What are you? A Force-sensitive?"

As if in answer, groans of hunger and pain came from all around, but these were not the lamentations of spirits. Living or barely-alive beings staggered into the clearing. More than a dozen. Thin, starved creatures, faces riddled with pustules and infection. They staggered, but when they saw Luke a deadly power animated them. They extended weapons, vibroblades and blasters, at Luke.

Several black, spherical droids then descended from the canopy and aimed weapons at him.

The hooded alien chuckled. "A welcome has been prepared for you. Thank you for divesting Tesh of that object. I will claim the Soul Stone for its true master now.

Luke slowly looked around and deliberately back at the alien. He held the green lightsaber between them.

"Somehow, I don't think putting this in your hands is what the Force brought me here to do."

"The Force," the hooded one scoffed. "Like everything else, it will bend to my father's will. You, Jedi, will be remembered for the honor of dying for him," he laughed in his gravely voice. "I'm acting like my brother. The Maw has always been the one with a way with words. I prefer to _act_!"

He lunged, and with him, the members of the Binder's former cult attacked in concert.


	5. Chapter 5

V

"Show-off," Han muttered when he got a look at the Outrider.

Dash Rendar's ship was polished to a high gloss and painted in arresting colors, sure to draw attention. All too flashy for a smuggler who had to get where he wasn't supposed to be unnoticed.

"So what do you think, Solo?" Rendar said. "The old girl gets a facelift?"

Han shook his head and Chewbacca grumbled. "How do you expect to slip by customs or Imp warlords noses with that?"

"I figure I should give them a pretty sight to see when I go streaking past," Dash leaned on the landing strut. "Besides, when you're the best you have to use a handicap now and then, just to keep things interesting. What about you, Solo? I've have thought you'd have gussied up the old girl, now you can afford it, or is the wife tight with the finances?"

"What's your game, Dash?"

"Just follow my lead and make it fast, Solo. My time's in demand."

"Fine Rendar, I'll show my Sabaac hand. Karrde wants you. I can't see why. You're more trouble than worth, but you've got some skill and he's got jobs that need done."

Dash pushed himself of the strut. "Well that's decent of him. Shame I'll have to turn him down."

"You haven't heard the offer yet."

"Don't need to. I've got my own thrusters firing. But how about this," Dash stepped up to Han, close enough their chests were almost touching. "Show me you still got it."

He glanced upward. "How bout a race? The picket buoy at the edge of the solar system. Hit the mark before me and I'm yours. If not, then you're out of luck."

Han felt himself grin. "Let's get started."

O

The Falcon lifted off, and Han's spirits lifted with it. The old girl responded to his controls as readily as ever. Chewie sat at the co-pilot's chair. Artoo stayed groundside, waiting with port security for Luke, like a faithful pet. The portmaster had commented no one would want the blasted, dented astromech for anything but scrap anyway, and the droid was probably too troublesome for that. Han had to respect the loyalty, even in a droid, but if anyone could take care of himself on a walk through the jungle it was Luke Skywalker, and if the kid needed his kiester pulled out of the fire, he just had to com.

"Alright old buddy, ready to wipe the smirk off that mynock sucker's face and send him crying hope to mama?"

Chewbacca howled in agreement.

"Let's do it then," he said. "Show him our afterburners."

They fought the atmosphere and Han didn't need to check his instruments to know the second he had slipped gravity's grip. He was speeding through void.

The space around the planet was tricky: it had been the site of a minor battle in Grand Admiral Thrawn's campaigns and the wrecked hull of a Katana dreadnaught and smaller gunboats hung overhead, in slowly decaying orbit and had to be circumvented.

_Or we can dive right through them._

Han checked the scan and eyeballed the Outrider out the cockpit. The com hummed.

"You want a head-start Solo? It's the least I could do," Rendar's mocking voice. Han wasn't fooled by the pose. The man was so jealous of Han it was eating away at him. That, and other things. Han thought of the drawn look in Rendar's face, the glint of blue in his eyes. There was a quality about him that made him think of someone riding high on glitterstim. The symptoms were the same, but maybe Rendar had turned to some other performance-enhancing stimulant. Whatever it was, he was getting plenty of his supply and he was loving it. Not that it would help him.

The Outrider was moving to go around the broken hull. The Falcon plunged through the belly of the dreadnaught. As agile as ever, Han dodged around a dangling section of hyperdrive, and shot out of the wreckage.

And he saw the Outrider's afterburners, klicks ahead of him.

"The krif?" Han said.

"Still slow, Solo?" Rendar's voice from the com. "Should I slow down for you?"

"Don't do me any favors," Han ground out.

This was not a straight flight, but a contest of skill. Not just the fastest ship, but the fastest hyperdrive, and not a straight run through hyperspace either. The race called for them to skip in mini-jumps to the edge of the system as they circumvented gravity wells along the way. The asteroids and two gas giants meant at least three mini jumps before they hit the end and launched their payload.

The length of Dash Rendar's shop scrolled past the Falcon.

"Alright Chewie, get ready to punch it!"

They soared past the in-system interdictor's field of influence and the stars extended in lines, the universe become white. A second later it was blackness and stars again, and the massive floating mountains of an asteroid. They dove around, rocks grazed the shield.

"Scan around Chewie, to see where – sithspawn!"

They were out of the belt and the Outrider, impossibly, was ahead of them.

"Next jump, go!"

This time, he didn't even see the Outrider go into hyperspace before they entered the Falcon dove under the skin of the universe. They popped out at one of the gas giants. Nothing to do but skirt the upper edge of gravity, and not a sign of the Outrider. They must have pulled ahead.

"Got that torp ready?"

Another jump. Another re-emergence into realspace at the cold edge of the system where the sun was just another distant star behind them if they cared to look, and the sensor buoy ahead.

The torpedo was a hollowed out shell filled with red ship-paint and treated with elements so the buoy's carrier waves back to the planet's detectors would instantly alert everyone-

"Sithspawn."

The signal from the buoy told him what had happened, even before he saw the green of Dash's paint covering it.

"Where were you, Solo? I got tired of waiting."

O

To add insult to injury, Dash beat Han back to the planet and had a booby prize ready. A trophy shaped like a sleeping Hutt.


	6. Chapter 6

VI

Luke leapt, avoiding a swipe of the hooded one's glaive by inches and swung his lightsaber. The alien blocked it and the blade sparked but did no damage. He somersaulted to over three cultists who attacked from behind and continued running to put distance between himself and his pursuers. Blaster bolts steamed the jungle air and scorched bark and branches.

As a duelist, this alien was deadly formidable. Luke knew at once he would be in the fight of his life one-on-one. Surrounded by dark side maddened cultists who cared nothing for their own pain or death and small hunter-killer drones, he had to run.

Three cultists blocked him, raising vibroblades and blasters. Luke send them flying with a shove of the Force. The droids sent blaster bolts and needles at him. Rocks and branches dislodged themselves and flew at them. The droids had to descend beneath the cover of trees to attack him and that made them vulnerable.

Luke ran with preternatural speed but somehow the aliens matched him. The cultists were burning themselves out to kill him but did not care. Then the alien's weapon slashed through a tree trunk. The dendric face seemed to scream in pain, but even that was a relief.

Impossibly, the glaive had slashed through the trunk and it fell, taking down others. Luke leapt on the leaning trunk and ran up to the standing trees. He swung his lightsaber behind him to block blaster bolts. Through the Force he sent the bolts back to the hooded one who somehow matched Luke and blocked them just as effortlessly.

Luke ran along the branchwork of other trees. He ran along one, stout as a bridge and strong enough to give the Kashyyyk a run for its credits.

A whistle alerted him to duck as the alien's polearm spun through branches, chopped them. Luke covered his head and urged the larger branches to miss with small Force pushes. He leapt again as, impossibly, the blade returned on its course to the cloaked and hooded warrior, slapped into his palm as he followed Luke into the trees.

Luke leapt, a droid flew into his path and took aim, but was sliced into sparking hemispheres by his lightsaber. Blasts from the cultists below flew at him and he ran, pursued at every step by the alien.

"This way!"

A voice he recognized. A figure appeared, waving to him. Luke landed near the child who guided him. A child surely not among the living, but there he stood, seemingly as solid as Luke himself. He could say nothing before the child turned and fled into the bush, not disturbing it, he noted, nor leaving footprints behind.

More blasterfire. Luke followed the child and they came to an abandoned mining installation. He saw supply huts, machinery and bodies. Many bodies. The site of a massacre and a recent one. Apparently the cult was no longer restrained by its master and had indulged their lust for blood on heretofore forbidden targets.

No time to take it in. Luke sped past the barracks and machine sheds. The entrance of the mine gaped before him in a hillside and without a second thought he ran in without bothering to pick up a lantern. The way lit only by his lightsaber. He ran along hovercart tracklines, taking one passage and then another. Soon enough he heard the rustle of a cloak behind him and shut off his lightsaber with a flick of his thumb. It was a beacon to his presence, and he had raced through Yoda's swampy obstacle course using only the Force as his guide, and he had constructed still more difficult challenges for himself. Blindness had no fear for him.

"Hurry this way!" his guide said, seemingly from beside him, keeping pace easily because, of course, the child was not there. "I know the mines. The outworlders sometimes gave us tools and trinkets if they would send children to work in the mines, in places adults could not reach and where droids were too expensive to risk, but there are places just big enough for you to fit."

He turned to one side to slip through a narrow crevasse.

"There's a crack not too far away, and you can get out through one of the upper shafts. That's the way we went when the foreman called a stop and everyone evacuated the mine."

"Evacuated?" Luke breathed. "Why?"

"We were digging through the tunnels in the deep shaft and-"

"Don't try to tell me, just think about it."

The spirit did, and Luke knew.

He moved swiftly but silently, aware of the weight of rock and hill above. A low hum was his only warning as a droid targeted him. A low hum and his mastery of the Force. The droid fired on his heat signature and Luke deflected the bolt back at it, made short work of the droid an ran, knowing the alien's spinning blade would be close behind, zeroing in on the green light of his weapon.

The alien's glaive cut through permacrete support beams like a vibroknife through bantha lard. The tunnel collapsed just as Luke exited into a wide, domed cavern. A shaft of sunlight through vents far above revealed a vast pit with levels of walkways, platforms and railings descending, where miners could work on the wall and extract ore.

Luke slashed another droid and lifted his lightsaber just in time to block the swing of the hooded one's blade. His pale skin looked sickly, bathed in the green light, but his face split with a grin of savage delight.

"I did not anticipate a challenge," the gravelly voice said.

"Few people do, but I'm still around," Luke said. "You'll find I'm full of surprises."

Luke kicked the hooded one back, but the alien wielded his weapon like a quarterstaff and swept Luke's legs out from under him. Luke executed a handstand and flipped down the pit as the point of the glaive sought his life. He cut again but only scorched the edge of the other's cloak. The hooded one struck with such force that Luke fell over the edge. The lightsaber flew from his grip as he caught the railing with both hands as he caught a walkway.

He reached out with his hand and the Force and the lightsaber reversed course, back to his hand.

The enemy's weapon intercepted it and sliced through in an explosion of sparks. Luke's lightsaber was destroyed.

Luke flipped himself onto the walkway, just as the cloaked one landed.

"You've done well. Better than I thought you would. But you never had a chance," the polearm returned to the alien. Luke backed away as the hooded one advanced in a slow stalk.

"You'll be honored to die this day, and you'll be honored to know my name," he raised his weapon. "I am Corvus Glaive."

Luke rolled, dodging the blade by millimeters and leapt down the pit, from walkway to walkway until he hit bottom, then he ran through another tunnel, pausing briefly to pick up a small item from a box of supplies.

The tunnel terminated in a duracrete seal.

"Run to ground, little rodent," Corvus Glaive said as he walked toward Luke. "You led me a fine chase, but the chase is over."

Luke watched him with absolute serenity. Corvus Glaive raised a hairless brow. A slight smile touched the corner of Luke's mouth, similar, though he did not know it, to Obi Wan's last moments.

The alien swung. Luke sidestepped at the last instant and a chunk of duracrete fell to the floor of the tunnel. A rush of noxious gas flooded in, a trapped gas pocket, and that was of course why the miners had evacuated.

Luke bolted, clearing distance at top speed, and as Corvus Glaive crouched to bound after him at equal or greater velocity, Luke activated the flare he had picked up and tossed it over his shoulder.

An explosion rocked the mine, flame engulfed Corvus Glaive and pursued the Jedi.

As the hillside crumbled and sink within itself, Luke flew from the shaft. He descended the slope even as the slope dissolved, and landed safe on level ground.

With a final look back at Corvus Glaive's impromptu tomb, Luke departed.

O

He passed the remains of the death cult. Whatever promises or lusts had enflamed them were gone, having taken everything from them and given nothing back. Empty, lifeless shells were all that remained, and the frail starved ghosts were already fading.

Luke ignored them and came to the altar where their victims had suffered and died.

Again he felt them, everywhere, but quiet. Waiting like prisoners buried in a deep, dark cell, finally hearing a liberator's tread and seeing a ray of sunlight as a cell door opened.

He gripped the back of the chair and pulled it over. He planted incendiaries he'd taken from the mining facility around the tormented trees. Then he took the object – the Soul Stone – from his pocket. The talisman that somehow drew these spirits to him now called to him. The Soul Stone, he was now sure, had rejected the bloody rites and burned and tormented Tesh even as it had burned it's fist trying to possess the stone.

He held it aloft and cleansing orange light flooded the world.

He stood on a grassy field. The trees waved in the distance under an orange-tinted sky. It did not seem a vision or dreamscape. If anything the environs were more real than real to his senses.

"You freed us," the child who had been his guide stood in front of Luke now, grinning broadly. "You took the Soul Stone away from him. It looked past Luke, at someone else. "Did I do good, bringing him here?"

"You did well," a deep, bass voice, deep and strong by very sad, answered. It was a voice Luke knew. He had heard it mechanically augmented and broken and exhausted. He saw his father again. Anakin Skywalker. Not the pale corpse-like being sealed in a sarcophagus of black armor, but a tall, strong man. The Jedi Anakin Skywalker once was and should have been.

Neither was he a transparent spirit tinted blue. He seemed…real?

"Father?" Luke held out his hand, then looked. This was not a synthetic hand at all, but real flesh and real blood. He opened and closed his fingers, touched them with his other hand. "Where are we?"

"We are inside the Soul Stone, or the realm it connects to. We are here, but only for awhile. You must return soon for there's work to be done and you will need the Soul Stone to do it. It's yours. You've paid in the only coin it will accept: sacrifice," Anakin said.

"I don't understand."

"It will be explained to you, but not by me. The Stones are here, but so is someone else."

Anakin stepped aside. A humanoid female approached. Her skin was green and her hair russet, and she moved like a warrior.

"Hello Luke Skywalker," she said. "My name is Gamorra, and I have things to tell you."

O

In the ruins of the hill, there was sudden movement as Corvus Glaive's polearm shot from the rubble, flew high into the air as if launched from a bowcaster, then arced and fell to bury itself by the blade.

For long moments it stood alone, it's shadow like a sundial's gnomon marking timeless eternity. Alone until another shadow took form beside it, and a sinewy white hand closed upon


	7. Chapter 7

VII

"I don't see how this adds up," Han said. "I mean time and space maybe. I see where that comes in. And what, mind and-" he glanced at the glowing orange stone on the table. "Soul."

"If sentience is part of creation, then yes," Luke said. He sat in a meditative pose on the other side of the table.

"But what about power and…reality? Those two sound a little…" he waggled his hand. "Vague."

"Reality. The ordering principle for all these raw materials. The inclination for things to come together in ways that work, and find new ways of working."

"And power?"

"Energy. Puissance. The momentum from the Big Bang that we're still riding. The ability to make things happen."

"Okay, I'm with you," Han said. "But what will they do?"

Luke unfolded himself from his seat. "That's the question. It depends where they are and who gets their hands on them. Any one Stone will give its bearer control over one of six elements of the cosmos, and what they'll do, either accidentally or with malicious intent, that's what I'm worried about. That's why we're going to be taking off as soon as you're re-fueled from your little jaunt."

"I don't see where you're going to start," something was niggling at the back of Han's mind. "We've got no idea where these Stones are and who has them. That's not even getting into this…what did you say his name was?"

Luke picked up the Soul Stone, studied it, and looked out to the stars before he spoke.

"Thanos.

"I met one of his children. Two actually, and judging by the mark he left on them, I'm pretty sure we don't want him getting them," he said.

"We're still at a dead end – quiet down you rust bucket!" he said as Artoo trundled in.

"What did you say, Artoo?" Luke looked at the little droid. "What did you see?"

"He's been like that awhile," Han said. "Little guy probably needs reformatted."

Artoo made a rude sound.

"He was pretty excited when he greeted me at the port. What is it?"

A panel slid aside in Artoo. A miniature holo image of Dash Rendar appeared, walking out of the cantina entrance. He passed a group and was gone, and there was no way Luke could see he could have ducked out of the way.

Then Artoo extended a jack into the Falcon and more data scrolled down the screen on top of the table.

"Looks like Artoo's been talking to the port computer," Luke said.

"AI gossip about Rendar's ship," Han said. "What about it, other than he beat me in a hyperdrive chase?"

"That's just it," Luke said. "Rendar's ship doesn't have a hyperdrive."

O

"Put the word out," Luke said. "We have to find out where he is."

He was putting together a new lightsaber. He had all the spare parts for one, but this would have a perfectly clear crystal, and one other, special addition.

"So you really think Dash has got this…Space Stone?" Han hesitated before naming it. He tried to sound skeptical but he remembered what he'd seen and sensed in Dash's eyes. The pure distilled something that called Han to the pilot's seat and the stars beyond, the urge to make those distant stars close and to go beyond them.

"I do," Luke said. There was total sureness to him. Whatever else the Soul Stone did, when he heard the truth he recognized it. "Meanwhile I'll get in touch with Leia-"

Luke went silent. Han looked over his shoulder. Luke was stiff, his face drawn. He had put the finishing touches on his new lightsaber, and he held it close against his chest.

"What is it?"

Luke said nothing, but held out his hand and activated the saber. A burning blade was born. The color of the Soul Stone.

Looking into it, Han felt the anxiety drain away and a strange conviction, something else took its place. Not something alien but something within him that turned to the glow like a flower to sunlight.

Chewbacca likewise stood transfixed by the light, and Artoo trilled.

When Luke spoke, he echoed his first master: "Millions of voices, crying out all at once, but not falling silent. Crying forever until they find peace."

Whatever Obi Wan experienced on his first ride on the Falcon, Luke felt it by several orders of magnitude worse, but if the Soul Stone granted him the sensitivity to feel the voices, he was also upheld and given the strength to endure it.

He shut off the lightsaber. "Someone's used the Power Stone." He turned on the holonet and heard the news. A world burning near the Maw Cluster, and the distinct shapes of four star destroyers.

"An Imperial terrorist force has claimed responsibility," the newscaster said. "The commander has released a statement."

The image of a beautiful red-haired woman in an Imperial admiral's uniform appeared.

"My name is Natasi Daala, and in the Emperor's name I punish this upstart rebellion."


	8. Chapter 8

VIII

A small, sleek craft came out of hyperspace near a planetoid driving in the sunless void between stars. The craft entered permeable shield and settled into a landing cradle. Several obsequious beings hurried to perform analysis and conduct repairs.

The hatch opened and Corvus Glaive strode down the ramp, cloak fluttering and glaive in hand.

A humanoid with the build of a human female awaited him. She held a staff of her own. A pair of horns curved from her head. Corvus approached her and looked away.

"He awaits us," she said softly.

The alien woman's name was Proxima Midnight. Corvus Glaive was her beloved and she his. Both were cunning and deadly in combat. Both had faced beings of immense power and never flinched from any task given to them, and it was with fear and trembling that both approached the rock-hewn levitating throne of the being who'd made them what they were.

As one, they knelt.

The throne and the massive being who occupied it faced out on a field of stars, contemplating.

"You have failed."

The deep voice and simple statement made both of them shudder with the memory of punishments long past.

"He was strong, Father," Corvus Glaive said. "The Soul Stone deemed him worthy," he held up his weapon. "I offer you my life."

Proxima Midnight seized his shoulder with one hand and would beg for mercy, but the being on the throne held up one massive hand.

"I knew the Soul Stone would be the most difficult to obtain. I should have gone myself, but other matters occupied me. That will change in the future. Meanwhile we proceed, and should this Jedi, or anyone else, stand in my way, they will have the honor I now without from you, Corvus.

"The honor of dying for Thanos."


End file.
